? 4 MT f , Y THE LIFE AND TRAVELS MUNGO PARK; WITH THE ACCOUNT OF HIS DEATH FROM THE JOURNAL OF ISAACO, THE SUBSTANCE OF LATER DISCOVERIES REL- ATIVE TO HIS LAMENTED FATE, AND THE TERMINATION OF THE NIGER. N E W- Y O R K : HARPER AND BROTHERS, CLIFF-STREET. 1840. Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1810, by HARPER & BROTHERS, In the Clerk's Office of the Southern District of New-York. ADVERTISEMENT. FEW subjects have excited a more lively interest among the curious and the learned, than the geo- graphical problem with regard to the termination of the Niger. This question was at length put at rest by the successful expedition of the Landers,* but not until after more than half a century of fruit- less effort and speculation, during which many val- uable lives had been sacrificed in attempting to trace to its outlet the course of this mysterious riv- er. Among those who had generously devoted themselves to this perilous enterprise, none was more distinguished than Mungo Park ; whose un- timely fate, after having triumphed over the most appalling difficulties, excited the deepest commis- eration and regret. Besides a minute and copious narration of the two expeditions of this celebrated traveller, the volume here offered to the public con- tains a succinct and interesting account of the la- bours of subsequent adventurers in the same field, bringing down the subject of African discovery to the most recent period. H. & B. New- York, May, 1840. * See Landers' Expedition to the Niger, Nos. xxxv. and xvxvi. " MY LORD — I have herewith sent you an ac. count of each day's proceedings since we left Kayee. Many of the incidents related are in themselves extremely trifling ; but are intended to recall to my recollection (if it pleases God to re- store me again to my native land) other particu- lars illustrative of the manners and customs of the natives, which would have swelled this bulky com. munication to a most unreasonable size. " Your lordship will recollect that I always FROM PARK. 211 spoke of the rainy season with horror, as being ex. tremely fatal to Europeans ; and our journey from the Gambia to the Niger will furnish a melancholy proof of it. " We had no contest whatever with the natives, nor was any one of us killed by wild animals, or any other accident ; and yet I am sorry to say, that of forty-four Europeans who left the Gambia in perfect health, five only are at present alive, namely, three soldiers (one deranged in his mind), Lieutenant Marty n, and myself. " From this account I am afraid that your lord- ship will be apt to consider matters in a very hope- less state ; but I assure you I am far from despond- ing. With the assistance of one of the soldiers I have changed a large canoe into a tolerably good schooner, on board of which I this day hoisted the British flag, and shall set sail to the east with the fixed resolution to discover the termination of the Niger or perish in the attempt. I have heard no- thing that I can depend on respecting the remote course of this mighty stream ; but I am more and more inclined to think that it can end nowhere but in the sea. "My dear friend Mr. Anderson, and likewise Mr. Scott, are both dead ; but, though all the Eu- ropeans who are with me should die, and though I myself were half dead, I would still persevere ; and if I could not succeed in the object of my journey, I would at last die on the Niger. " If I succeed in tho object of my journey, I ex- pect to be in England in the month of May or June, by way of the West Indies. "I request that your lordship will have the 212 LAST LETTERS RECEIVED goodness to permit my friend, Sir Joseph Banks, to peruse the abridged accounts of my proceedings, and that it may be preserved, in case I should lose my papers. I have the honour to be, &c. "MuNGO PARK." Park remained at Sansanding to the 19th of No- vember, when, just before starting, he wrote the fol- lowing letter to his wife. " Sansanding, 19th November, 1805. " It grieves me to the heart to write anything that may give you uneasiness, but such is the will of Him who doeth all things well ! Your brother Alexander, my dear friend, is no more ! He died of the fever at Sansanding, on the morning of the 28th of October ; for particulars I must refer you to your father. " I am afraid that, impressed with a woman's fears and the anxieties of a wife, you may be led to consider my situation as a great deal worse than it really is. It is true, my dear friends Mr. An- derson and George Scott have both bid adieu to the things of this world ; and the greater part of the soldiers have died on the march during the rainy season ; but you may believe me I am in good health. The rains are completely over, and the healthy season has commenced, so that there is no danger of sickness; and I have still a sufficient force to protect me from any insult in sailing down the river to the sea. " We have already embarked all our things, and shall sail the moment I have finished this letter. I do not intend to stop or land anywhere till we reach FROM PARK. 213 the coast, which I suppose will be some time in the end of January. We shall then embark in the first vessel for England. If we have to go round by the West Indies, the voyage will occupy three months longer : so that we expect to be in England on the first of May. The reason of our delay since we left the coast was the rainy season, which came on us during the journey, and almost all the soldiers became affected with the fever. " I think it not unlikely but I shall be in England before you receive this. You may be sure that I feel happy at turning my face towards home. We this morning have done with all intercourse with the natives ; and the saiis are now hoisting for our departure for the coast.* " To Mrs. Park." These two letters from Park, together with oth. £rs to his father-in-law and Sir Joseph Banks, and his Journal up to the date already mentioned, were brought by his guide, Isaaco, from Sansanding to the Gimbia, and thence transmitted to England. They were the last communications received from Park. * Ft is impossible to read these letters without feeling the truth of the remark made upon them by the editor of Park's Journal, that " they bear strong traces of that deliberate courage, without effort or ostentation, which distinguished his whole conduct;" and that his letter to Lord Camden, in particular, " breathes a generous spirit of self-devotion highly expressive of the character and feelings of the writer." 214 CHAPTER XIX. Rumours of Park's Death.— Isaacc's Mission to inquire into their Truth.— Account of Park's Fate obtained from his Guide. — Its Confirmation by subsequent Travellers. — Clapperton's Ac- count.— Exertions by the Brothers Lander to procure Park's Papers. — Memorials of him obtained by them. [1805-1830.] FOR some time after the date of the letters writ- ten by Park from Sansanding, nothing was heard of the expedition. In the course of the year 1806, vague reports were brought to the British settle- ments on the coast by the native traders from the interior of Africa, to the effect that Park and his companions had been killed. Years passed on and the rumours increased, though no distinct accounts upon the subject could be obtained ; till at length Colonel Maxwell, the governor of Senegal, obtain- ed permission from the British government to send a proper person to procure some more precise in- formation. For this service he was fortunately able to engage Isaaco. who had been Park's guide from the Gimbia. and who had brought back his letters and Journal from Sansanding. Isaaco left Senegal in January, 1810, and on the 1st of September, 1811, returned thither, with a full confirmation of the reports concerning Park's death. At Fadina, near Sansanding, he met with Amadi Fatouma, the very guide whom he had rec- ommended to Park to accompany him on his voy- age from Sansanding down the Niger. " I sent for him," says Isaaco, " he came immediately. I de- ACCOUNT OP PARK'S DEATH BY HIS GUIDE. 215 manded of him a faithful account of what had hap- pened to Mr. Park. On seeing me, and hearing me mention Mr. Park, he began to weep, and his first words were, * They are all dead.' I said, ' I am come to see after you, and intended to look every way for you, to know the truth from your own mouth, how they died.' He said that they were lost for ever, and that it was useless to make any farther inquiry after them ; for to look after what was irrecoverably lost was losing time to no purpose." According to the account of Amadi Fatouma, Park left Sansanding in the canoe with Lieutenant Martyn, three other white men, three slaves, and himself as guide and interpreter. He describes the voyage of the party down the river, past Jin- nie, through Lake Dibbie, and past Kabra, the port of Timbuctoo, into the kingdom of Haoussa. On entering this country Amadi Fatouma's en- gagement was at an end ; but, at Park's request, he remained two days longer with the party, and ac- companied them down the river as far as Yaour or Yaoorie. Throughout the voyage they were con- stantly exposed to the hostility of the natives. " We lost one white man by sickness," says the guide ; " we were reduced to eight hands, having each of us fifteen .muskets, always in order and ready for action." The natives repeatedly attacked them in canoes, and were repeatedly repulsed with great loss of life. Referring to one encounter, the guide says, " Seeing so many men killed, and our superi- ority over them, I took hold of Martyn's hand, say- ing, « Martyn, let us cease firing, for we have killed 216 ACCOUNT OF PARK'S DEATH too many already ;' on which Martyn wanted to kill me, had not Mr. Park interfered." At Yaoorie, Amadi Fatouma was sent on shore with a musket and sabre for the chief, to whom also he took several presents for the king. The chief asked him if the white men intended to come back ; and Park being informed of this inquiry, re- plied that he could not return any more. It is supposed that this reply induced the chief to with- hold the presents from the king, and that the anger thereby excited in the king's mind against the white men led to the last and fatal attack upon them. The catastrophe is thus recorded by Ama- di Fatouma. " Next day (Saturday) Mr. Park departed, and I slept in the village (Yaour). Next morning I went to the king to pay my respects to him ; on en- tering the house I found two men who carne on horse- back ; they were sent by the chief of Yaour. They said to the king, * We are sent by the chief of Yaour to let you know that the white men went away with- out giving you or him (the chief) anything ; they have a great many things with them, and we have received nothing from them ; and this Amadi Fa- touma, now before you, is a bad man, and has like- wise made a fool of you both.' The king imme- diately ordered me to be put in irons, which was accordingly done, and everything I had taken from me ; some were for killing me, and some for pre- serving my life. The next morning, early, the king sent an army to a village called Boussa, near the river side. There is before this village a rock across the full breadth of the river. One part of the rock is very high ; there is a large opening in GIVEN BY HIS GUIDE. 217 that rock in the form of a door, which is the only passage for the water to pass through ; the tide- current is here very strong, The army went and took possession of this opening. Mr. Park came there after the army had posted itself; he never, theless attempted to pass. The people began to attack him, throwing lances, pikes, arrows, and stones. Mr. Park defended himself for a long time ; two of his slaves at the stern of the canoe were killed ; they threw everything they had in the canoe into the river, and kept firing ; but, being overpowered by numbers and fatigue, and unable to keep up the canoe against the current, and no probability of escaping, Mr. Park took hold of one of the white men and jumped into the water ; Martyn did the same, and they were drowned in the stream in attempting to escape. The only slave remain- ing in the boat seeing the natives throwing weapons at the canoe without ceasing, stood up, and said to them, 'Stop throwing now ; you see nothing in the canoe, and nobody but myself, therefore cease. Take me and the canoe, but don't kill me.' They took possession of the canoe and the man, and car- ried them to the king. " I was kept in irons three months ; the king re- leased me and gave me a slave (woman). I imme- diately went to the slave taken in the canoe, who told me in what manner Mr. Park had died, and what I have related above. I asked him if he was sure nothing had been found in the canoe after its capture ; he said that nothing remained in the ca- noe but himself and a sword-belt. I asked him where the sword-belt was ; he said the king took it, and made a girth for his horse with it." This T 218 INQUIRIES OF CLAPPERTON sword-belt Isaaco afterward procured, and brought with him to Senegal. Such was the account which, after the lapse of so many years, was conveyed to England con- cerning the termination of this expedition. Its credibility was impugned by many persons ; and even so late as 1815, when Park's Journal was first published, the publisher thought it necessary to com- bat the opinion entertained by some persons, that Park might still be alive in some remote part of the interior of Africa. But of late years the account, in all its material features, has been amply con- firmed ; and the researches of our countrymen on the spot have satisfactorily established the fact, that Park sailed down the Niger from Sansanding to Boussa ; that he was there attacked by the na- tives ; and that, overpowered by numbers, he there perished in the Niger, so strangely verifying his qwn declaration in his last letter to Lord Camden, " that if he could not succeed in the object of his journey, he would at last die on the Niger." In the year 1826, Captain Clapperton visited Boussa, and saw the rock described by Amadi Fa- touma as the place near which Park and his com- panions were killed. " We had all along," he says, " been buoyed up with the hope of being able to obtain the Journal and papers of the late Mungo Park at Boussa ; but, to our great mortification and disappointment, we discovered that they had been either destroyed, or conveyed no one could tell whither, many years before. The inhabitants were exceedingly reserved on the subject of the fatal catastrophe, and usually gave equivocating or evasive answers to our inquiries as to the manner AT BOTJSSA. 219 in which it occurred. They seemed, indeed, over- whelmed with shame at the part they or their fa- thers had taken in the dreadful tragedy, and did all in their power to shift the blame from the shoul- ders of themselves and their countrymen." The same traveller succeeded in obtaining, du- ring his stay in that part of the country, some par- ticulars of the death of Park and the other mem- bers of the expedition ; the following is given by him as the most accurate and best authenticated version which he could procure of the " dismal sto- ry," as he styles it. " The voyagers had reached Youri in safety, and were on intimate and familiar terms with the sul- tan, father to the reigning prince, who entreated them to finish their journey through the countiy by land, instead of proceeding down the Quorra to the salt water ; observing that the people inhabiting the islands and borders of the river were ferocious in their manners, and would not suffer their canoe to proceed without first having rifled it of its con- tents, and exposed them to every species of indig- nity and insult ; and that, if their lives were spared, they would infallibly be detained as domestic slaves. This evil report was considered as the effect of jealousy and prejudice ; and, disregarding the pru- dent counsel of the sultan of Youri, the ill-fated adventurers proceeded down the Quorra as far as the island of Boussa, from whence their strange- looking canoe was observed by one or two of the inhabitants, whose shouts brought numbers of their companions, armed with bows and arrows, to the spot. At that time the usurpations of the Falatahs had begun to be the general talk of the black pop. 220 ulation of the country, that the people of Boussa, who had only heard of that warlike nation, fancied Mr. Park and his associates to be some of them, coming with the intention of taking their town and subjugating its inhabitants. Under this impres- sion, they saluted the unfortunate Englishmen from the beach with showers of missiles and poisoned arrows, which were returned by the latter with a discharge of musketry. A small white flag had been previously waved by our countrymen in to- ken of their peaceable intentions ; but this symbol not being understood by the people of Boussa, they continued firing arrows till they were joined by the whole male population of the island, when the unequal contest was renewed with greater violence than ever. In the mean time the Englishmen, with the blacks they had with them, kept firing unceas- ingly among the multitude on shore, killing many, and wounding a still greater number; till, their ammunition being expended, and seeing every hope of life cut off, they threw their goods overboard, and desiring their sable assistants to swim towards the beach, locked themselves firmly in each others' arms, and, springing into the water, instantly sank, and were never seen again. " The bodies of the two slaves who attempted to save their lives by swimming were pierced with a grove of arrows, but they subsequently recovered from the effects of their wounds, and were certain- ly alive when we were at Boussa ; but, as I under- stood afterward, they were carefully concealed, in order to prevent our making any inquiries of them relative to the affair. " Resistance being thus at an end, the floating GIVEN TO CLAPPERTON. 221 property had been eagerly laid hold of by the peo- ple of Boussa, and carried in triumph to their city. In the evening they formed a circle round it, and for several days and nights nothing was to be seen or heard but feasting and rejoicing ; but it happen- ed, before their revelries were well over, an infec- tious disease, whereof they had not previously had the most distant idea, raged in the island, and swept off the sultan, with numbers of his subjects ; and it was remarked that those who had been most ac- tive in the destruction of the strangers were cut off to a man, expiring in great agony. The peo- ple endeavoured to appease the wrath of the white man's God (by whose instrumentality they were firmly persuaded the destroying plague had reach- ed them) by the offering of sacrifices, and after- ward by setting fire to all the articles found on the surface of the water ; shortly after which, it is as- serted, the pestilence left the island. Meantime the news of the occurrence and its fatal results spread like wildfire through the neighbouring states, and the people of Boussa were stigmatized with a reproachful epithet for having been guilty of so heinous a crime. Hence the studied reserve of the reigning sultan and his subjects, which no con- siderations could tempt them to break through, so as to enter into the details of the tragedy ; and hence, also, the expression, so beneficial to us in those regions, and so prevalent among all ranks and conditions : 'Do not hurt the white men ; for if you do, you will perish like the people of Boussa.' " While at Saccatoo he had some conversation with Sultan Bello, the chief or king of the country, upon the subject. T2 222 CLAPPERTON'S RESEARCHES. " We then spoke," says Clapperton, " of Mungo Park, and said that, had he come in the rainy sea- son, he would have passed the rocks ; but that the river fell so low in the dry season, boats could only pass at a certain point. He told me that some timbers of the boat, fastened together with nails, remained a long time on the rocks ; and that a double-barrelled gun, taken in the boat, was once in his possession, but it had lately burst. His cousin, Abderachman, however, had a small printed book taken out of the boat, but he was now absent on an expedition to NyfFe. The other books were in the hands of the Sultan of Youri, who was tributary to him. I told the sultan, if he could procure these articles for the King of England, they would prove a most acceptable present, and he promised to make every exertion in his power." The following document was obtained by the same traveller : " Hence be it known, that some Christian came to the town of Youri, in the kingdom of Yaoor, and landed and purchased provisions, as onions and other things ; and they sent a present to the King of Yaoor. The said king desired them to wait until he should send them a messenger ; but they were frightened, and went away by the sea (river). They arrived at the town Bousa, or Boossa, and their ship then rubbed (struck) upon a rock, and all of them perished in the river. This fact is within our knowledge, and peace be to the end. "It is genuine from Mohammed ben Dehmann." (In addition to the above, there is a kind of post- INSTRUCTIONS TO THE LANDERS. 223 script appended to the document by a different hand, which, being both ungrammatical and scarce- 2y legible, there was some difficulty in translating, and giving a proper meaning to. The words, how- ever, are thought to be as follow, though most of them have been made out by conjecture.) "And they agreed, or arranged among them- selves, and swam in the sea (river), while the men who were with (pursuing) them appeared on the coast of the sea (bank of the river), and fell upon them and went down (sunk) in it." In the year- 1830, when the brothers Lander went out to Africa for the purpose of following the course of the Niger below Boossa to the sea, hopes were still entertained that they might be able to re- cover some of Park's papers ; possibly the contin- uation of his Journal from Sansanding, whence the previous portion of it, recording his journey to that place, had been despatched, together with the last letters that were received from him or his associ- ates. These hopes rested principally on the state- ment made by the Sultan of Yaoorie in his letter to Captain Clapperton, to the effect that he had in his possession certain books and papers which had be- longed to Park ; and to procure these memorials of , the unfortunate traveller was one of the secondary objects of the expedition. " Should you be of opin- ion." say the instructions of the colonial secretary, Sir George Murray, to Richard Lander, " that the sultan of Yaoorie can safely be communicated with, you are at liberty to send your brother with a pres- ent to that chief, to ask, in the king's name, for cer- tain books or papers which he is supposed to have, that belonged to the late Mr. Park." 224 RECOVERY OF A TOBE The Landers reached Boossa on the 17th of June, and on the following day beheld the scene of Park's disastrous fate. " We visited," they say in their Journal, "the far-famed Niger, or Quorra, which flows by the city, about a mile from our res- idence, and were greatly disappointed at the appear- ance of this celebrated river. Black rugged rocks rose abruptly from the centre of the stream, causing strong ripples and eddies on its surface. It is said that, a few miles above Boossa, the river is divided into three branches by two small fertile islands, and that it flows from hence in one continued stream to Funda. The Niger here, in its widest part, is not more than a stone's throw across at present. The rock on which we sat overlooks the spot where Mr. Park and his associates met their unhappy fate ; we could not help meditating on that circumstance, and on the number of valuable lives which had been sacrificed in attempting to explore this river, and secretly implored the Almighty that we might be the humble means of setting at rest for ever the great question of its course and termination."* On the following day, being June the 19th, the King of Boossa, accompanied by his consort, re- paired to the hut of the travellers. " Our visitors," says their Journal, " remained with us a considera- ble time, and in the course of conversation one of them observed that they had in their possession a tobe which belonged to a white man who came from the north many years ago, and from whom it had been purchased by the king's father. We ex- pressed great curiosity to see this tobe, and it was * See Landers' Expedition to the Niger. Harpers' Family Library, Nos. xxxv. and xxxvu BELONGING TO fAHK. 225 sent us as a present a short time after their depart, ure. Contrary to our expectation, we found it to be made of rich crimson damask, and very heavy from the immense quantity of gold embroidery with which it was covered. As the time when the late king is said to have purchased this tobe corresponds very nearly to the supposed period of Mr. Park's death, and as we never heard of any other white man having come from the north so far south as Boossa, we are inclined to believe it to be part of the spoil obtained from the canoe of that ill-fated traveller. Whether Mr. Park wore the tobe him- self, which is scarcely probable on account of its weight, or whether he intended it as a present to a native chief, we are at a loss to determine. At all events, the article is a curiosity in itself; and if we should live to return to England, we shall easily learn whether it was made there or not.* The chief himself has never worn the tobe, nor his predecessor, from a superstitious feeling ; « besides,' observed the king, * it might excite the cupidity of the neighbouring powers.' " On the following day the brothers endeavoured to obtain some farther information on the subject. " Sunday, June 20th. — The king sent a messen- ger this morning to inform us that he was a tai- lor, and that he would thank us for some thread and a few needles for his own private use. By * The travellers happily lived to return to England, but they did not bring the tobe with them, being obliged, as they descend- ed the Niger, to send it as a present to the King of Rabba, in order to propitiate that monarch, and induce him to allow them to proceed on their way. " Of course," they say, " we deeply lamented the necessity to which we were reduced on parting with this curiosity, but it was inevitable." 226 DISCOVERY OF this man he likewise sent a musket for us to repair ; but, as it is Sunday, we have declined doing it till to-morrow. Eager as we are to obtain even the slightest information relative to the unhappy fate of Mr. Park and his companions, as well as to as- certain if any of their books or papers are now in existence at this place, we had almost made up our minds to refrain from asking any questions on the subject, because we were apprehensive that it might be displeasing to the king, and involve us in many perplexities. Familiarity, however, having in some measure worn off this impression, and the king being an affable, obliging, and good-natured person, we were imboldened to send Paskoe to him this morning with a message expressive of the interest we felt on the subject, in common with all our coun- trymen ; and saying that, if any books or papers which belonged to Mr. Park were yet in his pos- session, he would do us great service by delivering them into our hands, or, at least, by granting us per- mission to see them. To this the king returned for answer, that, when Mr. Park was lost in the Niger, he was a very little boy, and that he knew not what had become of his effects ; that the deplorable event had occurred in the reign of the late king's predecessor, who died shortly after, and that all traces of the white man's effects had been lost with him. This answer disappointed our hopes, for to us it appeared final and decisive. But in the even- ing they were again raised by a hint from our host, who is the king's drummer, and one of the princi- pal men in the country. He assured us that there was at least one book saved from Mr. Park's canoe, which is now in the possession of a very poor man 227 in the service of his master, to whom it had been intrusted by the late king during his last illness. He said, moreover, that if but one application wqre made to the king on any subject whatever, very little was thought of it ; but if a second were made, the matter would be considered of sufficient impor- tance to demand his whole attention, such being the custom of the country. The drummer, therefore, recommended us to persevere in our inquiries, for he had no doubt that something to our satisfaction would be elicited. At his own request, we sent him to the king immediately, desiring him to repeat our former statement, and to assure the king that, should he be successful in recovering the book we wanted, our monarch would reward him handsome- ly. He desired the drummer to inform us that he would use every exertion, and examine the man who was reported to have the white man's book in his possession at an early hour to-morrow. Here the matter at present rests." The king kept his promise. On the afternoon of the following day the king went to see the trav- ellers ; he was followed by a man who had under his arm a book which was said to have been picked up in the Niger after the loss of Park. " It was enveloped," they say, "in a large cotton cloth, and our hearts beat high with expectation as the man was slowly unfolding it, for by its size we guessed it to be Mr. Park's Journal ; but our disappointment and chagrin were great, when, on opening the book, we discovered it to be an old nautical publication of the last century. The title-page was missing ; but its contents were chiefly tables of logarithms. It was a thick royal quarto, which led us to conjee- DISAPPOINTMENT. ture that it was a journal ; between the leaves we found a few loose papers, of very little consequence indeed ; one of them contained two or three obser- vations on the height of the water in the Gambia, one was a tailor's bill on Mr. Anderson, and anoth- er was addressed to Mr. Mungo Park, and contained an invitation to dinner. The following is a copy of it. " < Mr. and Mrs. Watson would be happy to have the pleasure of Mr. Park's company to dinner on Tuesday next, at half past five o'clock. An an- swer is requested. " ' Strand, 9th November, 1804.' " The king, as well as the owner of the book, looked as greatly mortified as ourselves when they were told the one produced was not that of which we were in quest, because the reward promised would not, of course, be obtained. As soon as our curiosity had been fully satisfied, the papers were carefully collected and placed again between the leaves, and the book as carefully folded in its envelope as before, and taken away by its owner, who values it as much as a household god. Thus all our hopes of obtaining Mr. Park's Journal or papers in this city are entirely defeated. The in- quiry, on our part, has not been prosecuted with- out much trouble and anxiety, and some little per- sonal sacrifices likewise, which, had they been ten times as great, we would gladly have made, while a single hope remained of their being effectual." At Yaoorie, where the chances of success were thought to be greater, on account of the sultan's affirmation in his letter to Captain Clapperton, the INQUIRIES OF THE LANDERS AT YAOORIE. 229 attempt was renewed ; but, though in the end it proved fruitless, the travellers gathered some inter- esting information concerning Park. They reach- ed Yaoorie on Sunday, the 27th of June, and their proceedings on the following day are thus related in their Journal. " Monday, June 2&th. — This morning we were visited by the chief of the Arabs of this city, who (if such a title can be used with propriety) is prime- minister to the sultan. He is a very old man, as dark as a native, and was dressed in the costume of his countrymen, which is very becoming. His beard was long and as white as snow, and a singu- lar tuft of hair, which was directly under the lower lip, did not look much unlike the tail of a white mouse. Though toothless, the old man was yet very communicative and intelligent ; and, among other things, he informed us that Mr. Park did not visit the city of Yaoorie, but remained in his canoe at the village where we landed yesterday, and de- spatched a messenger in his stead to the sultan, with a suitable present. This Arab had been sent by the sultan to the village with presents in return, and, by his description of Mr. Park's dress, he must have worn the laced tobe that we received of the King of Boossa, and which may account for the facility with which we obtained it, as well as the reluctance of the king to enter into an explanation of the man- ner in which his ancestor got possession of it. Mr. Park is stated to have been drowned in the same dress. The Arab informed us that he had in his possession a cutlass and a double-barrelled gun, which was part of Mr. Park's present to the sultan. We expressed a wish to look at these weapons, and 230 HOPE RENEWED. they were immediately sent for. The gun was very excellent, and handsomely mounted ; and we offered our own fowling-piece in exchange for it, which was cheerfully agreed to, but not till after the sultan's consent had in the first place been ob- tained." On the afternoon of the following day, the trav- ellers went to pay their respects to the sultan. " The conversation," they say, " commenced inx the usual complimentary way ; and then our object in visiting Yaoorie was briefly and indirectly hinted at. When we asked him whether he did not send a letter to the late Captain Clapperton, while that officer was at Koolfu, in which he affirmed that he had certain books and papers in his possession which belonged to Mr. Park, he appeared very much confused. After thinking and hesitating a good while, he answered with an affected laugh, 4 How could you think that I could have the books of a person who was lost at Boossa T and this was all that he said on the subject." On Sunday, July the 4th, Richard Lander visited the sultan to make a last application for Park's pa- pers. " He would give no decisive answer, but in the course of the day he said he would tell the chief of the Arabs everything relative to them, and would send him to us with the information. Accordingly, in the afternoon, the old man came as commanded ; but, instead of delivering the expected communica- tion, he said that we should certainly inspect the books to-morrow ; and, in the mean time, the sultan would thank us to sell him some gunpowder, and whatever red cloth we might have left. This re- finement in begging, or, in other words, this mean FINAL DISAPPOINTMENT. 231 rapaciousness on the part of the sultan, was never more apparent than in this instance." The rain preventing a communication with the sultan on the following day, the promised inspection was not afforded. On the morrow, however, the indefatigable travellers sent their attendant Paskoe with a message to the sultan, stating that they ear- nestly wished to receive a final and decisive answer with regard to the restoration of Mr. Park's papers, to obtain which they declared to have been their sole object in visiting him, adding, that it was their desire to quit Yaoorie immediately. " This bold and, to us, unusual language, seemed to have sur- prised and startled the sultan, and he instantly de- spatched the old Arab to inform us, that he deck- red to God, in the most solemn manner, that he had never had in his possession, nor seen any books or papers of the white travellers that perished at Boos- sa. The Arab likewise assured us that we were at liberty to proceed on our journey whenever we should think proper. Thus, notwithstanding all the false hopes that the sultan artfully held out to us. that Mr. Park's papers were actually in his pos- session ; the letter to Captain Clapperton, which ex- pressly stated this to be the case ; and the pitiful shuffling which he had displayed to keep us so long in suspense with respect to any true information, it appears then, without doubt, that he has not, and never has had, a single book or paper in the Eng- lish language. His only motive for the dastardly conduct he had displayed could have been neither more nor less than the hope of getting us into his power by misrepresentation and falsehood, in or- der to obtain some of the European articles which 232 PROCEEDINGS AT WOWOW. we had in our possession. That the sultan has sue- ceeded so well with us has not been our fault en- tirely, but even now he is by no means satisfied, nor is it likely that he will be while we remain with him. It is a satisfaction, at least, for us to know that the long-sought papers are at present nowhere in ex- istence." At a subsequent period, the hope of recovering them was again aroused. The travellers returned from Yaoorie to Boossa, and then visited the city of Wowow ; Richard Lander, however, being taken ill after a few days' stay, went back to Boossa, where the medicine-chest had been left. His brother John remained at Wowow a short time longer ; and in the journal which he kept during that period, he writes thus : "Wednesday, August 18th. — My curiosity has again been highly, and, perhaps, painfully excited, by hearing to-day that a certain man in the town was known to have had in his possession several books which he had picked up from the Niger at the period of Mr. Park's dissolution. As soon as I had learned this, I instantly sent to the man's house to ascertain the truth or falsehood of the rumour ; but he happened to be from home, and it was not till night, after his return from the bush, that I heard, with disappointment and sorrow, that the report was indeed well founded, but that the books had all been recently destroyed. The man said he had shown them to the Arabs who were in the habit of visiting the town, but they could not understand the language in which they were writ- ten, and merely conjectured that their contents re- lated to money matters, and were therefore of no RECOVERY OF A PILLOW. 233 kind of use to any one. Yet, notwithstanding their uselessness, the man is reported to have kept the books carefully concealed in his house till the arrival of Captain Clapperton at Wo wow ; but when he found that this officer made no inquiries for such books, he neglected to pay any farther attention to them, and they were destroyed shortly after, or, to use his own words, * they dropped or fell to pieces.' By the description which has been given of one of the books alluded to, I am inclined to believe that it must have been either Mr. Park's Journal, or a book of manuscripts of some sort. Thus have all our inquiries for the recovery of the lost papers of this traveller ended in disappointment, even when we had made almost sure of them, and our feelings excited to their highest pitch on more than one oc- casion, we have felt all the bitterness of hope sud- denly extinguished." Mr. John Lander afterward succeeded in pro. curing a stuffed pillow, which had probably been used by Mr. Park for a seat, and within which was enclosed a small Arabic manuscript, supposed to be a native charm. The recovery of it is thus related in the journal. " Friday, August 2Qth. — The widow Zuma has left a son at Wowow, who is about thirty years of age, and is suffered to reside here only because he is at variance with his captious mother, and disap. proves and condemns all her measures. This young man has been a constant daily visiter to me, and brings me occasionally a dish of pounded yam and palm oil, a few goora-nuts, or some such trifle. At our request he has busied himself sur- prisingly in endeavouring to procure information U 2 234 RECOVERY OF A PILLOW respecting the papers of Mr. Park. Though near, ly blind, Abba (for that is his name) is a hand, some and intelligent young man, of an equable temper, and of a mild, modest, and amiable dispo- sition, which has rendered him a great favourite with us. From the information with which he has supplied us, we learn that the late King of Wowow, who was father to the present ruler, became pos- sessed of much of Mr. Park's property, among which was a great quantity of guns and ammuni- tion, particularly musket-balls, which we have seen. Before this monarch's dissolution, he left them to be divided among his sons. Abba ascertained yes- terday that a large fat woman belonging to the king had a great pillow, which her deceased hus- band had snatched, among other things, from the Niger, near Boossa, and with which he had fled to Wowow, where he continued to reside till his death. This pillow, as it is called, had perhaps been used for a seat, for it was covered with bul- lock's hide, and strengthened by ribs of iron ; but the covering having been worn into holes with age and use, it was yesterday pulled to pieces by the owner, who found it to be stuffed with rags and cloth, cut into small bits. In the centre of the pil- low, however, to the woman's surprise, she discov- ered a little bag of striped satin, and feeling some- thing like a book, as she says, within it, she was afraid to open it herself, but presently sent word to Abba of the circumstance, who forthwith came and imparted it to me, bringing the little bag along with him. On opening it, I found a little iron frame, round which had been wound, with much ingenuity and care, a great quantity of cotton AND A NATIVE CHARM. 235 thread, which encompassed it, perhaps, not less than ten thousand times ; and, in consequence of its en- tangled state, it was provokingly troublesome to take off. Affixed to the little iron instrument, which is said to be a child's handcuff of foreign manufacture, and underneath the cotton, was an old manuscript, which, according to Abba's opin- ion, is a native charm. But as I mistrusted his knowledge of the Arabic language, and doubted his ability to give a proper interpretation to the contents of the paper, in my own judgment I was induced to believe it to be neither more nor less than a charm of some kind. Therefore I purcha- sed the manuscript, because it might be of greater consequence than I imagined, and because the bag in which it had been enveloped was of European satin, and the ink with which it had been written very different from that which is used by the Arabs, resembling our own so closely that the difference in the colour of both cannot be distinguished. We were advised by no means to intimate to the king the nature of Abba's inquiries, for the people are afraid of him, and declare that if he knew of any individual that had secreted ever so trifling a part of Mr. Park's property, he would be beheaded with- out mercy." Such were the results of the Landers' exertions to recover the papers of Park. At a subsequent period of the journey, during a visit paid to the King of Wowow, Richard Lander discovered, among that monarch's collection of charms, a small edition of Watt's Hymns, on one of the blank covers of which was written, " Alexander Anderson, Royal Artillery Hospital, Gosport, 1804." He also mentions that 236 HISTORICAL SKETCH. he saw a note from Lady Dalkeith to Park, of the same date as that from Mr. and Mrs. Watson, and acknowledging the receipt of some drawings from him. CHAPTER XX. Historical Sketch of later Discoveries—Four Hypotheses con- cermng the Termination of the Niger.— Hypothesis of its Identity with the Congo.-Park's Reasons in support thereof. — Reichard's Hypothesis of its Termination in the Gulf of Guinea.— Tuckey's Expedition to the Congo.— Clapperton's two Journeys.— Expedition of the Brothers Lander —Their Success. [1805-1830.] AN account of the life of Mungo Park may be appropriately concluded by a brief sketch of the subsequent history of the question concerning the termination of the Niger, and a statement of the successive steps by which its solution was effected five-and-twenty years after his death. His first expedition made us acquainted with the course of the Niger from Bammakoo to Silla, a distance of about 350 miles, throughout the whole of which the river was found to flow, roughly speaking, from west to east. The grand object of his sec- ond expedition was to trace the rest of its course from Silla, and to ascertain where this large river ended ; an achievement, of which it was said by Park himself, that, " considered in a commercial doint of view, it was second only to the discovery HYPOTHESES CONCERNING THE NIGER. 237 of the Cape of Good Hope, and in a geographical point of view, it was certainly the greatest discov- ery that remained to be made in this world." The failure of Park's second expedition left us still in ignorance concerning the course of the Ni- ger below Silla ; and for several years no farther attempt to dispel that ignorance was made. In the mean while, the subject, exciting much attention, was freely discussed ; and the information con- cerning it being vague and scanty, the conjectures were bold and numerous in proportion. The ques- tion which Park had failed to settle was looked upon as one of the grand geographical problems of the age ; and men reasoned and speculated about the termination of the Niger, just as they reasoned and speculated about a northwest passage from the Atlantic mto the Pacific. The different hypothe- ses which prevailed about thirty years ago were four in number. Three of them existed, and were stoutly maintained by their respective supporters, during Park's lifetime ; the fourth was started three years after his death, and, singularly enough, has proved to be the correct one. The four hy- potheses are the following : 1. That the Niger, after leaving Silla, continued to flow towards the east, across the heart of Af- rica, until it joined the Nile ; or, in other words, that the Niger was identical with that great west- ern branch of the Niger called the Bahr-el-Abiad, or White River, of which the sources then were, as indeed they still are, undiscovered. 2. That the Niger, after leaving Silla, continued to flow towards the east until, somewhere in the interior of Africa, it emptied itself into lakes, dis- 238 HYPOTHESES CONCERNING THE charging its surplus waters, in the rainy season, over a wide extent of level country. 3. That the Niger, after continuing its easterly course for some distance beyond Silla, turned to- wards the south, and, flowing many hundred miles in that direction, at last issued into the Atlantic Ocean, in about 6° south latitude, through that great outlet of fresh water called the river Congo or Zaire. 4. That the Niger, after continuing its easterly course for some distance beyond Silla, turned to- wards the south, and entered the Atlantic Ocean in about 4° north latitude, at the head of the Gulf of Guinea, through the numerous little channels which were known to intersect that part of the African coast, and which were supposed to form an enor- mous delta or alluvial tract, bounded on the east by the river called the Rio del Rey, and on the west by the Rio Formosa, or Benin River.* The first of these hypotheses, or that identifying the Niger with the western branch of the Nile, was maintained by Horneman, Mr. Grey Jackson, and other travellers ; but, even as early as 1815, it was justly pronounced by the editor of Park's Journal to be, of all the hypotheses, " the most unfounded, and the least consistent with acknowledged facts." It was, indeed, rather a loose popular conjecture than an opinion deduced from probable reasoning; nothing being alleged in its support except the bare fact that the course of the river, so far as known, was in a direction towards the Nile ; and a few vague notions of some of the African natives,f * See map of the course of the Quorra, vol. i., Landers' Ex- pedition to the Niger, No. xxxv. Harpers' Family Library, f The facility of establishing almost any position in African TERMINATION OF THE NIGER. 239 unworthy of the smallest attention. But, besides wanting evidence in its favour, this hypothesis was liable to a strong objection, arising out of this con- sideration, that the Niger, after flowing across the vast space which separated it from the Nile, must have descended to a level, much lower than the known level of the Nile, at the only point at which the junction could take place ; in other words, the hypothesis involved the absurdity of supposing the Niger to flow up-hill. The second hypothesis, or that of an inland ter- mination of the Niger, boasted the support of two of the most eminent among modern geographers, D'Anville and Major Rennell.* The grounds on which it rested were, first, a sort of general opin- ion to the same effect among the ancients ; and, secondly, the physical character assigned, upon the strength of various accounts, to a part of Africa towards which the Niger flowed, and which was represented to be a tract of low alluvial country, having several permanent lakes, and being annually overflowed for three months during the rainy sea- geography upon the testimony of the natives, is strikingly illus- trated by the reasoning advanced in favour of this hypothesis. Mr. Grey Jackson, who resided many years in Morocco, stated it to be a fact universally known among the rich African traders, that the Niger and the Nile were one and the same river, by means of which there existed a practicable water communication between Timbuctoo and Grand Cairo; and, moreover, he actu- ally gave, on the authority of " a very intelligent man who had an establishment atTimbuclno," the particulars of a voyage said to have been performed in the year 1780, by a party of seventeen negroes, down the Niger to Cairo. Yet in no part of its course does the Niger approach within 1800 miles of Cairo. * " On the whole," was Major Rennell's conclusion, " it can scarcely be doubted that the Joliba, or Niger, terminates in lakes in the eastern quarter of Africa." 240 PARK'S HYPOTHESIS OF THE son. The principal objection to it was the diffi- culty of supposing that so large a stream could be discharged into lakes and evaporated, even under an African sun. The third hypothesis, or that identifying the Ni- ger with the Congo or Zaire, was adopted by Park in consequence of the information and suggestions of Mr. Maxwell, an experienced African trader. The principal arguments in support of it are short- ly and clearly given in the Memoir addressed by Park to the colonial secretary, Earl Camden, in October, 1804. " The following considerations," says the trav- eller, " have induced Mr. Park to think that the Congo will be found to be the termination of the Niger : 1. " The total ignorance of all the inhabitants of North Africa respecting the termination of that river. If the Niger ended anywhere in North Af- rica, it is difficult to conceive how the inhabitants should be so totally ignorant of it ; and why they should so generally describe it as running to the Nile, to the end of the world, and, in fact, to a country with which they are unacquainted. 2. " In Mr. Horneman's Journal, the Niger is described as flowing eastward into Bornou, where it takes the name of Zad. The breadth of the Zad was given him for one mile, and he was told that it flowed towards the Egyptian Nile, through the land of the Heathens. The course here given is directly towards the Congo. Zad is the name of the Congo at its mouth, and it is the name of the Congo for at least 650 miles inland. 3. " The river of Dar Kutta, mentioned by Mr. IDENTITY OF THE NIGER AND CONGO. 241 Browne, is generally supposed to be the Niger, or, at least, to have a communication with that river. Now this is exactly the course the Niger ought to take in order to join the Congo. 4. " The quantity of water discharged into the Atlantic by the Congo cannot be accounted for on any other known principle but that it is the ter- mination of the Niger, if the Congo derived its waters entirely from the south side of the mount- ains, which are supposed to form the Belt of Afri- ca, one would naturally suppose that, when the rains were confined to the north side of the mount- ains, the Congo, like the other rivers of Africa, would be greatly diminished in size, and that its waters would become pure. On the contrary, the waters of the Congo are at all seasons thick and muddy. The breadth of the river,* when at its low- est, is one mile ; its depth is fifty fathoms, and its velocity six miles per hour. 5. " The annual flood of the Congo commences before any rains have fallen south of the equator, and agrees correctly with the floods of the Niger, calculating the water to have flowed from Bam- barra at the rate of three miles per hour." The principal objections to this hypothesis were, first, that it made the river to flow across a great chain of mountains, or rather across a tract, gen- erally supposed by geographers to be occupied by the vast chain of the Kong mountains, " the great central Belt of Africa," as they used to call it : secondly, that it assigned to the Niger a length which surpassed that of every other known river, and which, therefore, ought not to be admitted upon anything much short of distinct and positive proof. X 242 TUCKET'S EXPEDITION TO THE CONGO. The fourth hypothesis, or that which supposed the Niger to enter the Atlantic through the nu- merous channels which were known to exist in the low alluvial tract at the head of the Gulf of Guinea, was started by a German geographer named Rei- chard, and first published in the year 1808, nearly three years after Park's death. The principal ar- gument in its favour was afforded by the physical character of that part of the African coast, which bore a considerable resemblance to the deltas at the mouth of several large rivers, as the Nile, the Ganges, the Indus, &c. The principal objection to it was, that, like the third hypothesis, it supposed the Niger, in its passage to the southward, to flow through the barrier of the Kong Mountains, which were generally admitted to stretch uninterruptedly across the middle of the African continent. Nev- ertheless, this fourth hypothesis has been found to be correct in its material features. Such, then, are the various opinions which, for several years after Park's death, afforded to the learned and the speculative an ample fund of con- troversy concerning the termination of the Niger. The first renewal of the attempt to solve that great problem was made in 1816 ; when the British gov* ernment, seeking to test the correctness of Park's hypothesis, sent out an expedition under Captain Tuckey to ascend the Zaire or Congo, and deter, mine whether it really were the outlet of the Ni- ger. This expedition was conducted with great ability, yet the issue of it was eminently disas- trous, " adding largely to the catalogue of martyrs to the spirit of African discovery."* The enter- * Of sixty-six persons who embarked, twenty-one were doom- 243 prising commander, having succeeded in tracing the river upward to the distance of 280 miles, re- turned to its mouth, and died shortly afterward. The failure of this expedition left the question of the identity of the Niger and the Congo still unde- cided. Afte* the lapse of six years, another at- tempt to ascertain the lower course and termina- tion of the Niger was made by the British govern- ment, who for this purpose engaged Lieutenant Clapperton, in conjunction with Major Denham and Dr. Oudney, to penetrate to Timbuctoo. Start- ing from Tripoli, on the Mediterranean, with a caravan of merchants, Denham and Clapperton pro- ceeded to the southward, and, crossing the Great Desert, reached the vast lake bearing the name of Tchad ; and, while the former occupied himself in examining that remarkable inland sea, Clapperton penetrated to the westward as far as Sackatoo, a town standing ^on a river which probably runs into the Niger. Beyond Sackatoo Clapperton was un- able to proceed ; but he there learned that the Ni- ger ran to the southward, and that it entered the sea at Funda. This latter piece of intelligence was however of little use, inasmuch as nobody knew where Funda was. Returning to England with the information which he had gathered, Clapperton was raised to the rank of commander, and almost immediately afterward engaged to proceed on a second expedi- tion, in company with Captain Pearce, Mr. Dick- son, and Dr. Morrison. Upon this occasion he ed never to return. The captain himself, the lieutenant, the pur- ser, the botanist, the collector of objects of natural history, and the comparative anatomist, were among the sufferers. 244 CLAPPERTON'S SECOND JOURNEY. was attended by his "faithful servant," Richard Lander, who was destined within a few years to acquire celebrity in the field of African discovery ; and then, within a few years more, to add his name to the list of those who had fallen in that fa- tal field. In this second expedition, Clapperton entered Africa upon the west from the Atlantic, instead of, as in the former one, entering it upon the north from the Mediterranean. Starting early in De- cember, 1825, from Badagry, which is situated a little to the eastward of Cape Coast Castle, and journeying towards the northeast, he reached, about the middle of January, the town of Katunga, which is the capital of the kingdom of Yarriba, and which lies at a short distance to the west of the Niger. Continuing his journey hence to the northward, he reached the Niger at Boossa, the scene of Park's death ; crossing the river below that place, he proceeded to the northeast, until he arrived at the great commercial city of Kano, the capital of Hous- sa, which he had reached in his former journey from a different direction. From Kano he turned westward, and visited Sackatoo, which had been the limit of his progress to the westward on his former journey. At Sackatoo he was detained by Sultan Bello, the king or chief of the country there- tbout ; and on the 13th of April, 1827, he died of dysentery at a village in the vicinity of that town. His attendant, Richard Lander, " the only survi- ving member of the expedition," after performing his last duties to his master, returned to Kano ; and thence he proceeded to the southward, with the laudable design of embarking on some branch EXPEDITION OF THE LANDERS. 245 of the Niger, and accomplishing the great object of the expedition, by tracing the river to its ter- mination. He succeeded in reaching a place call- ed Dunrora, which he understood to lie to the west of Funda, and to be at no great distance from the sea ; but his farther progress was there stop- ped by the natives, and he was compelled to return to the northward and regain the coast at Badagry. Shortly after Richard Lander's return to Eng- land, the British government determined to employ him in another attempt to discover the termination of the Niger. On the 31st of December, 1829, in- structions were issued to' him from Sir George Mur- ray, the colonial secretary of state, to embark on board a vessel for the western coast of Africa, to proceed inland from Badagry until he reached the banks of the Niger, or the Quorra, as it had been found to be called in its lower course ; and, " after having once gained the banks of the Quorra, to fol- low its course, if possible, to its termination, where- ever that might be." On the 9th of January, 1830, Richard Lander embarked at Portsmouth, together with his brother John, who had " eagerly volunteered to accompany him ;" and, on the 31st of March, started from Ba- dagry on his journey inland. On the 17th of June the travellers reached Boossa, the scene of Park's death ; and, during the few days which they remain- ed at that place, they were indefatigable (as we have related in the preceding chapter) in endeavouring to recover some of the papers and other effects of their ill-fated predecessor. On the 23d of June they quitted Boossa, and, tracing the river upward, reached Yaoorie on the 27th ; at this place, also X2 246 THE NIGER FOUND TO TERMINATE (as we have likewise related), they renewed their efforts to obtain some of Park's papers. The ac- count which they give of the navigation between Boossa and Yaoorie exposes some of the obstacles which Park had to contend with. " The enterprising Mr. Park," they say, « must have had a thousand difficulties to overcome in his voyage down the Niger. It was about this time of the year that he arrived at Yaoorie, and the river, it is said, was then about the same height as it is at present. The canoe-men, who in all probability were his slaves, were said to be chained to the ca- noe, in order to prevent their running away. His pilot was unacquainted with the river any farther, and therefore he received his wages here in Yaoo- rie, and returned to his own country ; and Mr. Park, with a companion and three white boys, continued their journey down the Niger, without any person whatever to point out the safest channel or warn them of their danger." Returning to Boossa on the 5th of August, the travellers, after some delay, embarked on the Niger on the 20th of September, in the hope of accom- plishing the grand object of their enterprise, and tracing the river to its termination. In descending the river they met with various adventures, and were at times exposed to the risk of being pre- vented from proceeding on their way. Surmount- ing, however, with prudence and energy, all obsta- cles, they had the satisfaction, on the 14th of No- vember, of finding themselves " influenced by the tide ;" and on, the following day they entered Brass Town, where they saw, " with emotions of joy," a white man, who informed them that he was mas- IN THE GTJLF OF GUINEA. 247 ter of a Spanish schooner then lying in the First Brass River. This " First Brass River" they understood to be identical with that called by Eu- ropeans the Nun, one of those numerous streams which empty themselves into the Atlantic at the head of the Gulf of Guinea, and which, according to the hypothesis of Reichard, as above stated, were the outlets of the Niger. On the evening of the 17th of November, Richard Lander, who had pre- ceded his brother, arrived in the " Second Brass River," which is a large branch of the Quorra ; and, half an hour afterward, heard " the welcome sound of the surf on the beach." At seven o'clock on the following morning he arrived in the " First Brass River" (or the main branch of the Quorra), which proved to be the stream already known to Europeans by the name of the Nun ; and, about a quarter of an hour afterward, descried at a dis- tance two vessels lying at anchor within its mouth, a sight which, to use his own expression, occasioned emotions of delight " quite beyond his powers of description." A few days afterward he was re- joined by his brother ; and the two travellers quit- ting the coast of Africa, after various delays, arri- ved at Portsmouth on the 9th of June, 1831.* Thus, at last, the efforts of the British govern. * They left England again in 1832, with two small steam-ves- sels, on a trading expedition, fitted out by some merchants of Liverpool, with the view of ascending the Niger as far as Sa«k- atoo or Timbuctoo. Richard Lander was wounded iu this en- terprise, and died in consequence at Fernando Po, on the 6th of February, 1834. Asa commercial speculation, the expedition is stated to have wholly failed ; in a geographical point of view, it has been productive of a considerable accession to our stock of information concerning the lower part of the course of the Niger. 248 CONCLUSION. ment to ascertain the termination of the Niger were crowned with success ; and through the steady per- severance of two individuals, under the favour of Divine Providence, a question which had strongly agitated the world, and occasioned the sacrifice of many lives, was happily set at rest. The research, es of their predecessors had indeed diminished the ' uncertainty which attached to that question in the days of Park ; and, before they left England, it was generally thought that the Niger would be found to enter the Gulf of Guinea. To the Landers belongs the merit of establishing the correctness of this opinion, and at the same time dispelling a cloud of conjectures concerning the course which the river took before reaching that termination. Of the pru- dence, energy, and fortitude which marked their conduct, the interesting Journal which records their labours affords abundant evidence ; and it is high, but not unmerited, praise to say, that they were worthy to finish a work in which the first success- ful step had been taken by Park THE END. AMILY LIBRARY.